Review to examine access to NHS dentists

An independent investigation was launched by the government yesterday to find out why so many people have trouble finding an NHS dentist prepared to take them on.

The move, announced by the health secretary, Alan Johnson, is an admission that government reforms by themselves will not improve the situation. Some areas now had better access to NHS dentistry, the Department of Health said, but others did not.

Johnson said the government - which has been embarrassed in the past by images of long queues outside the surgeries of newly opened NHS dentists - had spent more than £2bn in an attempt to increase the availability of NHS dentistry in the last year and increased undergraduate training places by 25%.

"It is disappointing that despite this investment there remain areas of the country in which people are unable to find an NHS dentist," the health secretary said.

"I have appointed the independent review team to help us understand what more needs to be done to ensure that every person who wants to visit an NHS dentist can do so.

"The review team will also advise on how we can ensure that all NHS dental services meet the highest standards of care. We want to make sure that every patient's needs are met and that dentists are carrying out the right level of preventative care."

Official figures released in June showed that the number of people seeing an NHS dentist had continued to fall in spite of the reforms introduced in 2006.

The NHS information centre statistics showed a drop of 1 million people who had accessed an NHS dentist after April 2006, when the reform package came in. In the two years to last December, less than half the adult population went to an NHS dentist in England.

The government said at the time that the slump was only a temporary one and did not reflect the investment it had made, but yesterday's announcement suggests it now believes that further action is necessary.

The inquiry, which will be chaired by Professor Jimmy Steele, of the School of Dental Sciences in Newcastle, will look at ways the government and local NHS can work together to improve access and recommend whether funding should be matched to the size and needs of the local population.

It will look at whether the decline in complex treatments is a result of better dental health or is connected to cost, and at how the government can ensure that less affluent people get equal access to free care.